To improve the quality of care and reduce health disparities among minority populations, research has pointed to the vital importance of improving patient support and self-management skills and tailoring interventions to specific problems. The Research Core will enable us to achieve the following aims: expand collaborations to enrich research methodology and produce results more attuned to the communities of East and Central Harlem, develop and evaluate interventions using peer groups and existing services that target barriers to patient self-management and support, and disseminate the findings and foster the sustainability of effective and cost-effective interventions in these communities. Through the core, we will augment our research in ways not possible with the current individual projects: cross-fertilization of ideas at regular meetings will enrich our insights into current problems and approaches to address them; working groups on cross-cutting topics will facilitate collaboration on tools and procedures; and a seminar series will inform investigators about developments inside and outside of the Center. To further the Center's goals, we will supplement currently-funded clinical studies to evaluate interventions designed to address local barriers to patient self-management or support for 3 conditions that underlie health disparities Two randomized controlled trials (RCTs) evaluating nurse management to improve hypertension control and prevent recurrent stroke in East and Central Harlem will recruit additional patients to evaluate the effectiveness of condition-specific nurse-led group sessions followed by a peer-led program to improve patients' selfmanagement skills. As primary endpoints, the hypertension RCT will assess blood pressure reduction and quality of life at study months 9 and 18, and the stroke RCT will assess the underuse of effective prevention treatments 6 months after hospital discharge. We will also enhance a study to reduce underutilization of effective treatments after initial breast-cancer surgery with the addition of a patientsupport intervention. The patient-support intervention will identify patient barriers, connect women to existing services that address these barriers, and assess reduction in underutilization of effective adjuvant therapies 6 months after surgery. We will partner with community organizations to arrange peer groups, connect patients to services, and disseminate the findings locally and nationally.